The Complete Spiritual Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated Edition)
other world, that other lower spirits have to obey him. The light is dim, but even so the characteristics of this Chinaman get across very clearly, the rolling head, the sidelong, humorous glance the sly smile, the hands crossed and buried in what should be the voluminous folds of a mandarin's gown. He greets the company in somewhat laboured English and says he has many who would be the better for our ministrations. "Send them along, please!" says Mr. Tozer. The medium suddenly sits straight and his whole face changes into an austere harshness. "What is this ribald nonsense?" he cries. "Who are you, friend?" says Tozer. "My name is Mathew Barret. I testified in my life to the Lamb and to Him crucified. I ask again: What is this ribald nonsense?" "It is not nonsense, friend. We are here to help you and to teach you that you are held down and punished for your narrow ideas, and that you cannot progress until they are more charitable." "What I preached in life I still believe." "Tell us, friend, did you find it on the other side as you had preached?" "What do you mean?" "Well, did you, for example, see Christ?" There was an embarrassed silence. "No, I did not." "Have you seen the devil?" "No, I have not." "Then, bethink you, friend, that there may be truth in what we teach." "It is against all that I have preached." A moment later the Chinaman was back with his rolling head and his wise smile. "He good man—stupid man. He learn in time. Plenty time before him."
We had a wonderful succession of "revenants." One was a very dignified Anglican, who always referred to the Control as "this yellow person." Another was an Australian soldier. "I never thought I'd take my orders from a 'Chink,'" said he, "but he says 'hist!' and by gum you've got to 'hist' and no bloomin' error." Yet another said he had gone down in the Monmouth. "Can you tell me anything of the action?" I asked. "We never had a chance. It was just hell." There was a world of feeling in his voice. He was greatly amused at their "sky-pilot," as he called the chaplain, and at his confusion when he found the other world quite different to what he had depicted. A terrifying Ghurkha came along, who still thought he was in action and charged about the circle, upsetting the medium's chair, and only yielding to a mixture of force and persuasion. There were many others, most of whom returned thanks for the benefit derived from previous meetings. "You've helped us quite a lot," they said. Between each the old Chinese sage made comments upon the various cases, a kindly, wise old soul, with just a touch of mischievous humour running through him. We had an exhibition of the useless apostolic gift of tongues during the evening, for two of the ladies present broke out into what I was informed was the Maori language, keeping up a long and loud conversation. I was not able to check it, but it was certainly a coherent language of some sort. In all this there was nothing which one could take hold of and quote as absolutely and finally evidential, and yet the total effect was most convincing. I have been in touch with some Rescue Circles, however, where the identity of the "patients," as we may call them, was absolutely traced.
As I am on the subject of psychic experiences I may as well carry on, so that the reader who is out of sympathy may make a single skip of the lot. Mrs. Susanna Harris, the American voice-medium, who is well known in London, had arrived here shortly after ourselves, and gave us a sitting. Mrs. Harris's powers have been much discussed, for while on the one hand she passed a most difficult test in London, where, with her mouth full of coloured water, she produced the same voice effects as on other occasions, she had no success in Norway when she was examined by their Psychic Research Committee; but I know how often these intellectuals ruin their own effects by their mental attitude, which acts like those anti-ferments which prevent a chemical effervescence. We must always get back to the principle, however, that one positive result is more important than a hundred negative ones—just as one successful demonstration in chemistry makes up for any number of failures. We cannot command spirit action, and we can only commiserate with, not blame, the medium who does not receive it when it is most desired. Personally I have sat four times with Mrs. Harris and I have not the faintest doubt that on each of these occasions I got true psychic results, though I cannot answer for what happens in Norway or elsewhere.
Shortly after her arrival in Melbourne she gave us a séance in our private room at the hotel, no one being present save at my invitation. There were about twelve guests, some of whom had no psychic experience, and I do not think there was one of them who did not depart convinced that they had been in touch with preternatural forces. There were two controls, Harmony, with a high girlish treble voice, and a male control with a strong decisive bass. I sat next to Mrs. Harris, holding her hand in mine, and I can swear to it that again and again she spoke to me while the other voices were conversing with the audience. Harmony is a charming little creature, witty, friendly and innocent. I am quite ready to consider the opinion expressed by the Theosophists that such controls as Harmony with Mrs. Harris, Bella with Mrs. Brittain, Feda with Mrs. Leonard, and others are in reality nature-spirits who have never lived in the flesh but take an intelligent interest in our affairs and are anxious to help us. The male control, however, who always broke in with some final clinching remark in a deep voice, seemed altogether human.
Whilst these two controls formed, and were the chorus of the play, the real drama rested with the spirit voices, the same here as I have heard them under Mrs. Wriedt, Mrs. Johnson or Mr. Powell in England, intense, low, vibrating with emotion and with anxiety to get through. Nearly everyone in the circle had communications which satisfied them. One lady who had mourned her husband very deeply had the inexpressible satisfaction of hearing his voice thanking her for putting flowers before his photograph, a fact which no one else could know. A voice claiming to be "Moore-Usborne Moore," came in front of me. I said, "Well, Admiral, we never met, but we corresponded in life." He said, "Yes, and we disagreed," which was true. Then there came a voice which claimed to be Mr. J. Morse, the eminent pioneer of Spiritualism. I said, "Mr. Morse, if that is you, you can tell me where we met last." He answered, "Was it not in 'Light' office in London?" I said, "No, surely it was when you took the chair for me at that great meeting at Sheffield." He answered, "Well, we lose some of our memory in passing." As a matter of fact he was perfectly right, for after the sitting both my wife and I remembered that I had exchanged a word or two with him as I was coming out of Light office at least a year after the Sheffield meeting. This was a good test as telepathy was excluded. General Sir Alfred Turner also came and said that he remembered our conversations on earth. When I asked him whether he had found the conditions beyond the grave as happy as he expected he answered, "infinitely more so." Altogether I should think that not less than twenty spirits manifested during this remarkable séance. The result may have been the better because Mrs. Harris had been laid up in bed for a week beforehand, and so we had her full force. I fancy that like most mediums, she habitually overworks her wonderful powers. Such séances have been going on now for seventy years, with innumerable witnesses of credit who will testify, as I have done here, that all fraud or mistake was out of the question. And still the men of no experience shake their heads. I wonder how long they will succeed in standing between the world and the consolation which God has sent us.
There is one thing very clear about mediumship and that is that it bears no relation to physical form. Mrs. Harris is a very large lady, tall and Junoesque, a figure which would catch the eye in any assembly. She has, I believe, a dash of the mystic Red Indian blood in her, which may be connected with her powers. Bailey, on the other hand, is a little, ginger-coloured man, while Campbell of Sydney, who is said to have apport powers which equal Bailey, is a stout man, rather like the late Corney Grain. Every shape and every quality of vessel may hold the psychic essence.
I spend such spare time as I have in the Melbourne Botanical Gardens, which is, I think, absolutely the most beautiful place that I have ever seen. I do not know what genius laid them out, but the effect is a succession of the most lovely vistas, where flowers, shrubs, large trees and stretches of water, are combined in an extraordinary harmony. Green swards slope down to many tinted groves, and they in turn droop over still ponds mottled with lovely water plants. It is an instructive as well as a beautiful place, for every tree has its visiting card attached and one soon comes to know them. Australia is preeminently the Land of the Myrtles, for a large proportion of its vegetation comes under this one order, which includes the gum trees, of which there are 170 varieties. They all shed their bark instead of their leaves, and have a generally untidy, not to say indecent appearance, as they stand with their covering in tatters and their white underbark shining through the rents. There is not the same variety of species in Australia as in England, and it greatly helps a superficial botanist like myself, for when you have learned the ti-tree, the wild fig tree